Luke 18:9-14 to 1 Kings 21:27 · The Hyperlinked Bible

Luke 18:9-14 → 1 Kings 21:27

Allusion

Later text

To some who trusted in their own righteousness and viewed others with contempt, He also told this parable: “Two men went up to the temple to pray. One was a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed, ‘God, I thank You that I am not like the other men—swindlers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and pay tithes of all that I acquire.’ But the tax collector stood at a distance, unwilling even to lift up his eyes to heaven. Instead, he beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man, rather than the Pharisee, went home justified. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

Earlier text

1 Kings 21:27BSB

When Ahab heard these words, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth, and fasted. He lay down in sackcloth and walked around meekly.

+ 3 more earlier texts

Earlier text

Ezra 9:6BSB

and said: “O my God, I am ashamed and embarrassed to lift up my face to You, my God, because our iniquities are higher than our heads, and our guilt has reached the heavens.

Earlier text

Ezra 10:6BSB

Then Ezra withdrew from before the house of God and walked to the chamber of Jehohanan son of Eliashib. And while he stayed there, he ate no food and drank no water, because he was mourning over the unfaithfulness of the exiles.

Earlier text

Esther 9:31BSB

in order to confirm these days of Purim at their appointed time, just as Mordecai the Jew and Queen Esther had established them and had committed themselves and their descendants to the times of fasting and lamentation.

Walk the Square · a single-voice walk of this pair around the Clowney square13:45

Significance

In the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector, the despised man "stood at a distance, unwilling even to lift up his eyes to heaven ... beat his breast and said, 'God, have mercy on me, a sinner!'" (Luke 18:13) — and "went home justified" (18:14). 1 Kings 21:27 records a startling Old Testament instance of such self-abasement even from a wicked king: when Ahab heard God's sentence, "he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth, and fasted ... and walked around meekly," and the LORD relented from bringing the disaster in his days (21:29). The connection is analogical: the outward posture of humbling — the torn heart, the lowered eyes, the beaten breast — draws even divine mercy, and if the guiltiest of kings found reprieve in genuine self-abasement, how much more the tax collector who casts himself wholly on God. The contrast is with the Pharisee who exalts himself and is not justified. The telos is the ground of that mercy: the tax collector's plea, literally "be propitiated toward me," is answered only because a propitiation would be made — the humbled Son, numbered with such sinners, whose atoning death makes it just for God to justify the one who beats his breast (Romans 3:24-26). Self-exaltation cannot receive Him; only the empty hand does.

Found via

Beale & Carson (eds.), Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament (2007)

Reference Type

Allusion

Connection Method(s)

Analogy